YOUR WORLD IS GONNA BURN [p]

He rarely slept well anymore--in fact, Jet normally stole slim hours between his duties in the pride to nap or doze. He was laying fully awake now, his eyes partially lidded and idly observing the child at his side, who seemed perfectly content to sleep beside him. At times, the cheetah cub would roll involuntarily in his direction, pressed against Jet's ribs, before starting awake and crawling a few inches away again, earning amusement from the leopard. Kajetan was good at feigning sleep by now--when he did sleep, he dreamed, and when he dreamed he dreamed of home.

He had yet to become accustomed to this new world, this Menagerie. In reality it was not so different from the desert in which he had been raised. But there Kajetan had the illusion of freedom, even while pertaining the knowledge that he could never leave that place, something that had become too obvious when he and Selah had tried to create a family on the rims of his father's territory. The leopard let out a whoosing breath as he remembered her ravaged eyes--

Snap. It was a discreet sound, but with it came the sense that he was being watched. Kajetan's eyes did not open fully, but he cracked them as a shadow danced in front of him and the cub--it was Wanderer. Her white fur was unmistakable, and she cast them a hesitating glance before continuing in the direction she had been going. Kajetan lay for a moment longer, contemplating. No one would be furious with him if he continued to "sleep". She was the leader. She could do what she wanted. But if that was the case, why sneak about it? Once he was certain she was out of hearing distance, he drew himself up, and with an affectionate glance at the cub he trotted off in the direction the female had gone.

The farther he followed her, the more intrigued and--yes, he could admit to this--furious he became. What was she thinking, disappearing in the middle of the night without a guard? That was reckless. Kajetan hadn't decided if he had respected her or not as of that moment, and as he inched by Nilda territory, nodding at the patrols he saw, he was coming to the conclusion that if she was going to be so... so... infuriatingly irresponsible... he could not, under any circumstances, respect her. He was getting himself worked into a bit of a fury, and so by the time her trail led from Nilda territory to Lawaii, Kajetan was half thinking that it would be better to simply drag her by the scruff of her neck back to Analoya land.

Kajetan's pale eyes surveyed the mountain ranges, and he moved hesitantly through them, unaccustomed to the rocks and inclines. He slunk, stiff with uncertainty. This was enemy territory. The birds were renowned for their dislike of trespassers, and he was twitching at the slightest noises.

It only got better. Her scent led away from Lawaii territory and toward Bellator, the very edge of each of them, and Kajetan was fuming. Stupid. She was being stupid. He could not remember her saying anything about a mission or a scouting expedition or the like. Why was she doing this in secrecy? Most of the members, himself included, would have jumped at the opportunity to accompany her. Even if Jet was still uncertain of what he thought of her, she was his leader, and he owed her for saving his life months ago.

He finally slunk around another incline, and she came into view. He noted that she was beautiful in that instant, half-lit by the crescent moon, white and black. But whatever admiration he had for her beauty was tarnished by his confusion in the face of her behavior, and his irritation in the face of her secrecy and recklessness. How was he supposed to trust a leader that did things like this? Jet came into view, settling a few feet beside her without a word. His eyes flicked in her direction, raging quietly.

He did not speak for a long instant. He simply looked out over Bellator land, quiet and imposing, until he thought that his fury was properly conveyed. "You are a fool to come out here alone, Teller. Across enemy lands, no less. Bellator or Lawaii would happily gut you and send Analoya into ruin." He snarled, but quietly, with his lips curling up over his long teeth. "What are you doing here?" Jet sat himself on his haunches, mirroring her posture, his tail flicking irritably behind him. His paws kneaded the ground, claws sinking furrows into the soft earth.

Kajetan said nothing to that--because wasn't what she said the definition of foolishness? Putting oneself into unnecessary danger? That was not daring so much as reckless. For some reason, it reminded Jet of Selah, so readily throwing herself in some potentially dangerous situation. They are nothing alike, he reminded himself.

He was surprised when she mused of her homeland. She described something that Kajetan had never seen, of course. Mountains like that were a mere rumor to him, a fairy-tale. He would have found it impossible to imagine if it were not for the fact they were certainly sitting on a cliff, and even with that visual he could not imagine it... grander. "It sounds beautiful," Jet admitted, grudgingly. He had come to chastise her, not compliment her home.

One ear flicked in her direction before he turned his head, his pale eyes bright even in the darkness. He took her in. "There are exceptions to that, though. You can't just excuse them as not being a large threat when you don't know what they are capable of." Jet had once known a very sickly leopard, not right in body or mind, but they had still been clever enough to almost overthrow Jet's father when he was a mere cub. His eyes remained on her for a moment longer before he looked down over the meadows with her, his eyes catching on clusters of trees. She had saved him from the "hoofed ones" when he had first come to be in the Menagerie, and for that he still owed her. It was why he stood so diligently, so aware of the noises around him. He wasn't going to let any harm befall her, even if he did not necessarily agree with being where they were.

He listened quietly to her reasoning, and what she said seemed rational enough. If they were in Analoya territory, he would have understood perfectly. As it was Jet was unnerved being so far from the safety of the redwoods. He rolled his shoulders. "They weren't threatening Xochi specifically. They are threatening the entire pride." He looked at her sidelong, his tail curling around his haunches, merely the black tip flicking now. "As for your solitude, I'm sorry for disturbing it. It didn't sit right with me to allow my leader to wander off by herself, as capable as she may be." He shrugged rather indifferently.

Although, I admit I am... happy for the company. This surprised him. Jet's expression showed it, in the way his previously half-narrowed eyes widened, and he tilted his body in her direction attentively as he turned to look at her. He might have said something, but then she asked about his home. For a moment he said nothing. He merely shifted his weight to one side, glancing over his shoulder toward the darkness behind them. He had heard nothing that seemed like a threat, and he was confident enough to think that (really) if a flock of birds attacked them, they wouldn't be too badly off. So Jet lowered himself to his stomach, stretching out his muscular forelegs, one paw dangling idly over the overhang.

"I was born in the Gobi Desert and raised there. It isn't natural for leopards to be social, but I grew up surrounded by other retromorphs." He paused for a moment, trying to decide on a way of describing it. "It was beautiful and harsh. The land would as soon kill you as give you a rare gift. Water was hard to come by and so was food. But... they were the clearest skies, the most graceful dunes. You could see for miles without running out of land, and in the sun everything looked gold. It was almost impossible to get by, sometimes, but it was worth it. Just when you thought there was nothing to keep going on, the desert would give you something more." He was quiet, remembering. He missed it.

As it was, his eyes befell the twisting river of Bellator territory, and they settled there.

Kajetan's expression remained impassive until she began to speak, and then his ears flicked in her direction, followed by an inquisitive tilt to his head. He had been so focused on begrudgingly "respecting" her until that point that Jet had forgot to look at her like an individual. She was someone that he was a stranger toward, and as her words came out, he thought that maybe they were a little more alike than he had first thought. He paused for a moment, uncertain of what to say. He wanted to be abrasive or standoffish, like he had been, but instead he slipped into a seemingly neutral tone, something that went at odds with his almost childishly interested expression.

"A good life." He struggled for words. He was unaccustomed to conveying his feelings through them, and so he butted his shoulder against hers, the gesture surprisingly affectionate. "That is what my father used to say, of things. If nothing else, live a good life--it will be a sad one, also, if it has anything worthwhile in it." Kajetan shrugged his shoulders, and turned his face back toward the open meadows. "I think I would have liked to see your home."

He was relieved when he heard the quiet rumble of her purr--at least that meant she was not too saddened by the subject they discussed. "Which do you prefer? Wanderer or Eden? I always think its kind of... funny, I guess... that we don't get to choose our own names. My people, they value names more than I think they should. There are two parts to mine. Kajetan Vash'ka--it is to say, I am Kajetan, the descendant of Vash'ka. My father was a proud leopard. They always told me that "Vash'ka" was the word our people used for "Life", and being that it is my, uh... second name... means that it is supposed to be my origin. Heh. Kajetan of Life, my father would say. He was a worshiper of the world before he was ever my sire or the Jian Taun's leader." Kajetan was surprised by how easily the words flowed. It had been too long since he had discussed his homeland and his culture, and for a moment he felt almost unbearably self-conscious after he finished--these were personal things, intimate things, bits and pieces of his past that he cherished, and things that she might not fully understand.

Despite himself, he was relaxing, muscle by muscle, stretching out his forelegs in one instant, watching as his claws extended, before he settled his chin on them. "I... did not wander so much. We stayed in the desert, because there were so few humans living there, and we could survive without interference. My family had adapted to the desert years and years ago, and they were kind of like a... tribe, I would guess. My father and mother led it, and I was meant to once their lives ended." He trailed off quietly.


"Did you never get lonely? With just your mother and your father, and then just your father?" Kajetan rolled his head to the side, allowing himself to look at her. His ears had twitched forward, and his expression was light and open, no remains of his previous sneer. "It isn't natural for leopards to be social, but we were all these human-animals, and there were many of us. Some came and went, but we were a people that were hot and cold. When I was young, I was never alone. There was always someone at my side, touching me, talking to me, teaching me. My people communicated through touch as much as through our strange language. Being so... I don't know. I never touch anyone anymore." From his tone of voice, it was clear that he missed it. And Kajetan did. He missed it dearly. He missed the early mornings and the long nights, the younger leopards and the older, gray ones. He missed the way that they were always jostling, changing, loving, hating.

Kajetan looked away from her, out toward the open plains. They were beautiful, really. It was just an alien beauty, something that would always make him feel uneasy if not amazed. "Why are you telling me these things?" He no longer knew what to call her. Was it appropriate to call her Wanderer, or Eden? He opted for the best option: to not say her name.

"Then perhaps," he replied, rather slyly. "I will call you Eden." There was something to be said for calling someone by a name no one else knew them by. Jet had always thought it to be intimate, in a way, and lately he had been craving some kind of intimacy. It isn't natural, he found himself thinking. For me to be so alone.

He also found himself thinking of the pure whimsy of it. He rarely thought about where he came from, anymore. The Gobi desert seemed like a dream. Vash'ka'Enshka is what they had called it. Life and Death.

Her musings drew him out of his thoughts. Jet listened intently, curious. He had never heard stories like this, or of lives like that--frankly, he hadn't even imagined that it was possible to live in such a way, and it saddened him until he realized that that had simply been her life. "My pride has a similar belief. When you die, you aren't lost. You become everything." Kajetan snorted, however. He didn't know what he believed in anymore.

"Ah... isn't that the trouble? They did love me. But I was... well, outcasted." He rolled his shoulders in a halfhearted shrug. "While they believed strongly in love, they also believed strongly in punishment and laws." He did not elaborate.

When she explained her reasoning, he found himself... growing to respect her, more and more. He was startled when she butted her head against his own, an affectionate gesture, an the shock showed momentarily in his eyes before he closed them, merely reveling the contact. Too many feline were finicky with touch, and he craved it, just simple little gestures. She couldn't know how much it meant.

"But the dome isn't so much different from the outside world. And isn't that true? Life is life, no matter where it is." He wished he could give her more than that, but he was choked on words.

Come. For the first time, he did not hesitate to obey her. Jet stood, his eyes eating up the vast darkness before him. And then he turned to follow her.


ooc: I imagine we can just continue this in the next thread?